The Intern Blu-ray Review

Like a good many females between the ages of thirty and fifty, I have a soft spot in my heart for just about any film Anne Hathaway is in. I’m not sure what it is about her that allows her to be instantly relatable to women everywhere, but she somehow manages to pull it off. That’s a good thing, too because in THE INTERN, it was important for her to connect with the audience almost as much as it was for her to connect to her co-star, Robert De Niro. As great as Hathaway is in THE INTERN, it’s Robert De Niro that steals the show and for 121 minutes, reminds us why he’s an acting legend.

THE INTERN follows Ben Whittaker (Robert De Niro), a retired widower in his early 70’s who is looking for ways to fill his free days when he stumbles upon a flyer for an internship specifically for senior citizens. After landing the job, he is assigned to the internet company’s tough and hard-to-work-for founder, Jules Ostin (Anne Hathaway). The two form an unlikely friendship as Jules is making a big work decision while dealing with personal issues.

THE INTERN seems like a ridiculously simple premise which is why it is so surprising how well it works. The chemistry between Anne Hathaway and Robert De Niro is easy, natural and as charming as you can imagine. De Niro plays a gentleman so flawlessly that you forget he’s made a living out of playing gangsters, and Hathaway is fantastic as usual portraying the working mom who is trying to run her business and keep it to the standards she sees fit. The interactions between the two are so endearing and their chemistry is what drives this film and make it so surprisingly enjoyable. Hopefully these two actors will team up again in the future so we can see what else they can cook up.

Though De Niro and Hathaway gave great performances in THE INTERN, the film is not without fault. There were various storylines in the film that just felt out of place or completely unnecessary in general. It seemed that there was going to be more to the storyline between Jules and her mother, but that was a plot that wasn’t really explored and ended up in an unnecessary break-in scene with De Niro and his co-workers. There was also some tension between Jules and the mothers in her daughter’s school that was touched on a few times, but never really came to full head by the time the film ended. I figured these were just storylines that were shortened and we would see some cut scenes in the special features, but sadly that’s not the case here. These parts of the film just added about 15-20 minutes of unnecessary run time to the film and with some harsher editing, they could have been cut out completely. Director Nancy Meyers did a decent job, but she probably could have tightened the story a little bit more and made the film even better.

The trailers for THE INTERN invoked memories of THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA, but it’s not that kind of film at all. It’s a story about a young woman coming to terms with who she is and what she wants and an older man accepting his new purpose in life. Although it has some uneven tones and some unnecessarily ridiculous humor thrown in, the film excels when it’s telling a human story and that’s what makes it special.

BLU-RAY REVIEW

Video: THE INTERN looks sharp and crisp on this Blu-ray and really accentuates the different colors Meyers used in the film.

Audio: The audio was fine.

Learning from Experience (4:45): Cast and Crew give their opinions on the story and characters.